Page 115 - Studia Universitatis Hereditati, vol 13(2) (2025)

ologico Nazionale di Venezia, inv. no. 161) with (Mantua, Osor, Hermitage), others lowered
certainty has the attribute, associated with the (Tralles, Cherchell, Venice) – suggests, in my
Muses. This ambiguity leaves open the possibili- view, that these figures were designed to be in-
ty that the figure may have originally represent- stalled in complementary pairs or even groups
18
ed another mythological character, identified in architectural juxtapositions. This interpre-
by the unpreserved attribute, and reinterpreted tation is further supported by reconstruction of
19
within the caryatid tradition. the original placement of the Caesarea figure.
In this light, the female figure from Apsorus
Hypothetical Setting may have stood to the left of a large architectural
The archaeological context and precise findspot structure, perhaps symbolically ‘supporting’ the
of the Apsorus statue are unknown, making it epistyle with her elevated right arm.
impossible to determine its original function Nevertheless, considering the well-docu-
with certainty. Based on the discovery of mar- mented integration of the imperial cult within 115
ble portrait heads believed to represent members the province of Dalmatia (cf. Cambi 1998; Buzov
of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, along with a ded- 2015) that is in Apsorus evidenced by the discov-
ication to Jupiter and an inscription referencing ery of three marble portrait heads and a fragmen-
a priest of Minerva, scholars have envisaged the tary torso of the members of the Julio-Claudi-
existence of a Capitolium (Faber 1982, 74; Mat- an dynasty (Cambi 1982; Cambi 1998, 46–7), it
ijašić 1989–1990, 261). Within this framework, is plausible to suggest that the female statue was
Aleksandra Faber proposed that the so-called originally part of an architectural context in-
‘Medea’ might actually represent Juno, and that spired by the decorative program of the Forum
the statue could have originally stood in the of Augustus, a model widely emulated through-
Capitolium (Faber 1982, 74). However, this in- out the western provinces as a means of express-
terpretation is difficult to reconcile with the un- ing loyalty and devotion to the emperor (cf. La
finished treatment of the statue’s back, which Rocca 2011, 1004). However, in the absence of
suggests it was intended to be viewed only from additional evidence, this interpretation must re-
the front. main hypothetical.
Regrettably, the architectural remains from
Apsorus are extremely limited and provide no The Dating
proper information regarding the statue’s origi- For both statues located in Venice Renato Pol- The Caryatid from Osor (Apsorus): A Provincial Reinterpretation of a Classical Motif
nal placement. Given that iconographic schemes acco and Gustavo Traversari suggested that they
comparable to caryatides were often employed may have been produced in Hadrianic era. In
20
for statues displayed in public buildings without the absence of archaeological context or distinc-
a structural function – such as thermae or the- tive iconographic attributes that might narrow
atres – or served as decorative elements in elite the chronology, the dating of the Apsorus stat-
domestic settings (Witschel 1995, 250; Zank- ue can only be hypothesized in relation to other
er 2015, 110), it is most plausible that the cary- finds from the site and the broader historical de-
atid from Apsorus likewise belonged to such a velopment of the settlement (cf. Zaninović 2005,
context. 16–8; Blečić 2007, 200; Jadrić-Kučan 2011, 143–
The variation in the position of the arms 6; Blečić Kavur 2015, 18–21). Notably, the major-
among the statues of the caryatides Tralles/ ity of the Roman stone monuments unearthed
Cherchell type – some with the right arm raised in Osor date to the 1st century AD (Cambi 1982,
18 For such an arrangement and some examples of it see Zanker (2015, 110–1).
19 See reconstruction in Kreilinger and Atif Hamza (2019, 48).
20 Sono da ritenere due modesti lavori decorativi di gusto arcaizzante, creati nel II sec.d.C., forse in epoca adrianea, piuttosto che in ep-
oca antoniniana come altri hanno supposto (Polacco and Traversari 1988, 21).